Hey Tamers, East here. I finally had a chance to test out the new BT21 Hunters deck at my local card shop. For folks who aren’t familiar, I’ve been honing and learning the deck for about a week and a half prior, and I thought my local card shop, ShakaShaka Toreka out here in Tokyo, Japan was a great testing ground for everything I’d learned up till now. Akihabara has a pretty competitive and talented group of players, so whenever I test a deck, if I can do well at locals, I think it’s a good sign for the deck’s potential.
Below is the list that I used for the event, and I can still say this is not the final version. I think there are more optimizations that can be made to better suit the environment, so if you’re wondering if this is a good list or not, let me fast forward the process of you copy-pasting the image in a discord channel and asking: No, it’s not. I won’t go into the reasons why, cause it’s not the point of this post, but I did want to give you the disclaimer.
So now, on to the fun part, talking about my games from the event and the war stories!
Round 1: vs. Megidramon
This matchup really just comes down to a racing for damage. The issue is that, kind of like LordKnightmon in the past, Megidramon doesn’t have to commit too much to the board, and the deck doesn’t really use tamers, so it’s really hard to defend against them once they make their move. I added in Darkdramon ACE as a way to give me some kind of counterplay The deck mostly draws for it’s effects so I felt somewhat confident I might be able to find it. I was hoping I could test it out here.
My opponent went first, putting me at 2 with a Wisdom Training. Luckily, I got a good opening hand so I evo’d up an old BT12 Gumdramon in raising and played down the BT21 Gumdramon whose card draw netted me a new Tagiru tamer and a BT21 Arresterdramon Superior Mode. I passed him back over at 1, and it seemed like he was still missing some of his cheaper searches in wisdom trainings, so he ended up dropping a Guilmon X-Antibody to dig out more of his necessary cards. At this point, I’ve seen him pick up a Guilmon X (the one he just played) and a Megidramon. The pressure is on to just swarm as fast as I can.
I pull out of raising, evo my BT21 Gumdramon into a Shoutmon King Version to play a free Tagiru Tamer, swing with the other Gumdramon from raising who checks 1 security and gets deleted.The Monimon Digi-Egg lets me draw and I save the Gumdramon, under Tagiru. I immediately put the saved Gumdramon back to work. Evolve the Shoutmon King Version into the Arresterdramon Superior Mode I drew one turn prior, and slot the Gumdramon for a 2-cost evolve. I’m able to help replenish my hand on swing thanks to my inheritance effect, and the King Version inheritance burns up the Guilmon X on board. He’s at 3 security left.
His turn opens up with him at 2 memory, and I feel good. He hasn’t built up any trash, and he stays in raising which means he’s still looking for pieces. He ends up with another low-tempo turn using a second Wisdom Training that I assume he drew, and then evolving in the back into Guilmon X, and then Growlmon. He passes me back over 2, and my board is still completely intact.
I open up my second egg, and think that with this I can pretty much seal up the game. I slot a Digimon under Tagiru from his Start of Main Phase effect, get the free card draw and it puts me to 3. It’s that here I really feel the pain of the new Arresterdramon Superior Mode. After that initial turn, he really is just a big stick only hitting for 1 security. I evo into a BT21 Gumdramon in raising, swing again with my Superior Mode for some more card draw, and I end up checking a Purple Memory Boost. SHIT. My plan was to spend 4 memory by DigiXrossing a Psychemon for 2, and then raw evolve into a BT21 Arresterdramon to play down the BT12 Tagiru, setting my opponent at 1, and letting me start every turn thereafter at 3. There wasn’t much I could do about the Purple Memory Boost at this point, but I still felt like my plan was a good one, so I passed him back to 1 memory, with 2 Digimon on board, and another waiting in raising. If I could see the other end of his turn, I had the game wrapped up.
He drew, and judging by his face I was really in doubt if he could kill me, but then, he pulled out of raising and I knew it was all over. He spent the Memory Boost, to go to 3. DOUBLE GRAVITY PRESS, go to 7. Growlmon to Growlmon X, discard a Guilmon with Rush. Spend the training to go to WarGrowlmon for 1-cost and then mill 2 from the top of his deck. Attack with WarGrowlmon two evolve into Megidramon for 4.
Counter Timing comes, and I look at my hand, and Darkdramon ACE, is….. nowhere to be found (you had one job), and so his attack goes off without a hitch. He checks 2 of my security, aka Weenie Hut Jr. (Quartzmon, where were you man?!) He blows up the board, gains 2 memory (He’s at 4 memory now, for the folks keeping track at home), in the process discards a 3rd security, Uses Growlmon X’s lingering effect to play a Guilmon with Rush, then goes back to process Megidramon’s effect to replay a WarGrowlmon from trash. WarGrowlmon mills 2 more cards from the top of his deck, Gigimon lets him pick back up the Megidramon. He spends the remaining training to evo into Megidramon for 2 cost (He’s at 2 now), Jack Raid to go to 3, and then has just enough cards in both players trash (25) to play his Promo Gallantmon for 2. This deletes the Megidramon, who uses WarGrowlmon’s inheritance effect to discard my 4th security, then he swings on the 5th with Guilmon, and closes the game with the Gallantmon who has Rush.
I went from Hero to Zero in one turn flat 😭😭😭 We both reviewed at the end of the match, and the deciding factor for the whole game was me hitting the Memory Boost. Without it, I saw the next turn, and could have likely closed the game out myself. The lingering question that I had was should I have still checked that Security that ended up being a Mem boost? Maybe the answer is no. I didn’t think to ask him what he would have done had the Mem Boost not come out, so I guess that the answer is lost to time.
Round 2: vs. Medusamon
When it comes to Red on Red violence, I’m a little afraid if my opponent gets a good hand using Medusa. My opening hand was actually alright, I just didn’t have a tamer, so I mulliganed, and then got no Lv 3’s as a reward for being greedy. Turn 1 I ended up DigiXrossing a Shoutmon King Version with an Arresterdramon to play down a BT21 Tagiru for free. The issue is that with these kinds of starts, your hand is UNFATHOMABLY DRY. No card draw and you’ve spent 3 cards, leaves you with almost no options if your next 1 or 2 draws aren’t great. We’ll come back to this in a moment. Anyway, it’s his turn now, and he’s on 3.
His first turn, in the back he evolves up the line to Agumon, plays an Offense Training, and caps his turn off by playing the new BT21 Owen Dreadnaught for 3. Uh oh, things are getting kinda spooky. My turn comes around, and I draw a Tuwarmon. Yikes. I slot it underneath Tagiru, and pray for divine intervention. Prayers answered. Gumdramon comes off the top, and immediate evolve in raising. Anyway, back to the board, this Shoutmon King Version is not going to live for much longer, so I send him off to war, evolving for 2 (Thanks Tagiru cost reduction) into BT21 Superior Mode. Double punch. One of my sources lets me draw, but I’m pretty much running on fumes. I play watchmaker to pass the turn, and hope for the best. Another Tagiru, and BT21 Arresterdramon come up on the search. I’m walking a tightrope on card draw, but these little inches forward are still progress I think to myself.
My opponent pulls out of raising, and I mentally salute my Superior Mode to thank him for his service. As expected, my opponent burns the Training to evolve into Cyclonemon, but then something weird happens. He plays an Elizamon. He pulls up the search and he ends up grabbing another level 3, and a Medusamon. I thought to myself, oh yeah, he can just attack at end of turn thanks to the Owen Tamer, so maybe it’s not that weird. RIP Superior Mode. He passes the memory over to me to 2 with another Offense Training, and ends up grabbing Raging Serpintine, the option card, and we both sit there for a few seconds. He looks at me, and says “It’s your turn.” And it’s at this point, that reality slaps me across the face. I had been so worried about my hand this whole time, that I didn’t realize, he couldn’t find a Level 5. He took a gamble, (and maybe rightly so. All that search to come up empty-handed I feel like is pretty rare for a Liberator deck) and it didn’t pay off. And that was basically the game. I pushed out of raising, slotted a card under Tagiru, evo’d the Gumdramon into BT21 Arresterdramon to play another Tagiru for free. Superior Mode, who was also probably astounded he was still alive, Raided into the Cyclonemon, and I used the Shoutmon King Version inheritance to burn the Elizamon for a check. To finish things up I just played Watchmaker to cap him at 1. The search from Watchmaker made me evermore thankful that my hand had been slightly less dogshit than his. Not everyone has a happy ending in this story though. Superior Mode unfortunately passed away on that next turn, a victim of a Raging Serpintine, but his life insurance payment kicked in, giving me 7 memory to win comfortably after his death. It’s at this point, I don’t remember how I won exactly, but it involved another superior mode, and a rush Arresterdramon.
I had wanted to talk to him about the rest of the game, but asking him about why he pulled the Agumon out of raising, he seemed like he didn’t really wanna talk much about it, so I kind of ended it there. It was at this point that one of the Digimon Discord members Dew (Hey Dew!) visiting from Singapore came into the shop and we talked about how he was visiting Japan and his trip so far.
Round 3: vs. Gallantmon
From here on out, I forgot to takes any notes, so apologies, details will be a little harder. I do remember the major points of the games though. The opponent went first, and similar to the Megidramon, spent a few turns looking for their pieces. I remember him opening with the BT19 Guilmon in raising and then early searching with offense training, putting me at 2. I actually had a good hand starting, had two level 3’s a level 4 and a tamer to boot, so the classic Hunter start. Evo in raising, and then DigiXros the Shoutmon King Version for a free tamer play. I ended up playing the BT12 Yuu Amano tamer, and while the memory bonus normally is nice, because he doesn’t refund you any cards when you tuck cards under him, it quickly eat into your card advantage.
Anywho, I passed the opponent back over just 1 memory and he ended up just hard playing Guilmon for a search, ended up finding a level 4, but no Tamer (thank god). With the memory swinging back over to my side, I wanted to take advantage of the early game and push as much damage as I could. Because they’re biggest defense is usually a Gallantmon Crimson Mode ACE, if I could get within kill range, even if my board got wiped, I could still build up extra swings using cards like the BT12 Psychemon and Arresterdramon that gives rush, even after I saved it under Tamers. That was a plan for the future though, for now, I got to Superior Mode, and punched through with his effect, using the King Version’s inheritance to burn up the Guilmon.
From here things get a little hazy, but I remember he basically evolved all the way up to Gallant X with a X-Antibody Protoform. So as you’d expect, my board pulled a Houdini and disappeared. During the course of this he spent the training, and ended up playing a Red Scramble, but luckily he wasn’t able to attack, so I only ended up losing 1 security from the whole exchange. I did my best to try and rebuild, DigiXrosing a level 3 for 2 cost, and then evolving into a Tuwarmon to pass turn and De-digivolve his Gallant X. My hope was that he didn’t find a second one, and would be stuck with the WarGrolwX underneath for a rather lackluster turn, giving me time to rebuild. It was at this point, that I completely missed the fact he played a scramble and used the delay effect for his Training, so my entire more was a complete waste. He was using the alt art Red Scramble from the new Adventure starter decks, and I mistook it for an Offense Training alt art. He simply put the Gallantmon back on top of his deck, razed my board and my security. Lesson learned, PAY ATTENTION.
Round 4: vs. Xros Hearts
This match got weirder and weirder the longer it went on. I had a decent start getting down a Digimon in raising and an early BT21 Gumdramon for some extra draw. As soon as I saw him hatch the egg, I knew this was going to be a speed match. I just needed to take tempo and pray he didn’t assemble EX6 with the Metor Rock Soul option. That combo checks for 4 and they can end the game VERY early with it. My opponent started with a somewhat typical Xros Heart opening. Evo in raising and hard play a BT10 Taiki Tamer to search. He definitely made a mistake playing Digimon in Tokyo that night. He should instead have played the slots in Vegas. He opened 3 of the new BT21 OmniShoutmon, in a row from the search. So dealing with the illusion of choice, he tucked one under the Taiki and added 1 to hand.
I figured that was either going to be really good for him or really bad, but wasn’t sure what to make of it yet. So I just focused, held my Lv3 in raising, and then evo’d my Gumdramon into the BT21 Arresterdramon to get the free BT21 Tagiru Tamer on the board.
He pulled out of raising and ran his Shoutmon into security. He got to save for his troubles and the Pickmons netted him some draw as well. From there though he just hard played the 4 cost Taiki, Kiriha, Nene triple tamer, and passed the memory back over. I finally learned my lesson and was paying attention now. He hadn’t played any other XrosHeart Digimon. I think his hand might be mostly tamers. So I took the memory he gave me along with the advantage, to pull out of raising, evolve into Shoutmon King Version to play a second Tagiru on board, ran it into his security to Save, and then for 1 cost, Digivolved my Arresterdramon previously on board into BT12 Arresterdramon Superior Mode, and swung again. I got 2 draws from the first attack thanks to the inheritance effects, and as I picked up the Darkdramon ACE from the final draw, I realized something else. While I was busy trying to figure out what was in his hand, I hadn’t paid attention to mine.🤦♂️ I had no more level 3’s. Lots of level 5’s and 4’s but no 3’s. I capped off the turn by playing a Watchmaker, to try and fix my hand. Tamer and Arresterdramon superior mode, yikes.
The memory tipped back over to his side, and he looked anxious. He mulled for a bit, and said, “Well, here we go” and he played BT12 Shoutmon X7: Superior Mode. He was only able to reduce the cost by 7, so he passed me a ton of memory, but was able to bottom deck my entire Superior Mode stack. He was like, “It was a desperation play, but I know it’s pretty much over now”. I sat and looked at my hand of bricks, my face deadpan. With a big sigh I slammed Darkdramon ACE. I De-Digivolved his Superior mode, wiped the Shoutmon underneath, and passed him back over to 1. PHEW 😅 He drew, and to my surprise, DigiXrossed a Shoutmon King Version to play down the new BT21 Taiki. Unfortunately, this sealed the deal for him, as my resulting Darkdramon, and the 2 cost Psychemon I DigiXrossed allowed me to pull a Rush Arresterdramon from under 1 of my tamers, and I cheaply digivolved into it and BT21 Superior Mode while keeping turn, letting me attack twice, and then the Darkdramon to close out the game. What a wild ass ride.
We took some time to talk about the game at the end, and he said that he was desperately searching for a Lv6 Shoutmon DX, because his entire deck was Shoutmon themed. I asked him if he used EX6, and he said nope. As I thought back to the match, it made perfect sense. Every Digimon he played or that I saw was a Shoutmon. He said seeing both of the OmniShoutmon from before was really good, but he was trying to combo them into Shoutmon DX, to wipe my board, and get the security attack +1. If he could attack with OmniShoutmon and survive the swing, he could go into Shoutmon DX for 1 cost after DigiXrossing. I told him that during the game, I was so focused on EX6 coming down, that I didn’t even consider or notice all signs pointed to him not being there. Was I even paying attention?
Wrap Up & Final Thoughts
And so my final result was 2-2. Not a great day, but I learned a lot for sure. I also felt some of the gaps in my deck, where I wanted to be more aggressive and with a few different card choices, I think I can do that, to help capitalize on some of the early advantages I had. I’ll say that if you haven’t tried Hunters before, and have even a passing interest in the deck, I definitely recommend checking it out. It’s a lot of fun, and a lot deeper than it originally looks.
Finally thanks for reading all the way to the end. I hope you enjoyed reading this event report. Despite becoming a Digimon TCG YouTuber, I really enjoy writing, and reading other people’s stories of their games and events, and so I hope to do more written content as well. If you really liked this and would like to see more, please become an official YouTube member on my channel. It really does go a long way in helping me create better Digimon Card Game content, be it videos or written blog posts like this. You can also be proud of the fact that your memberships will toward actively trying to help grow the scene.
Until next time, Thanks for reading!
